1912 . 
THE RURAL? NEW-YORKER 
FORAGE CROPS FOR PENNSYLVANIA. when the ground is dry many trees die back in this not spraying. It is like play war. 
I have a farm of 95 acres in Bucks County, Penna., 
16 miles northwest of Trenton, N. ,T., with a dairy of 15 
cows, and five horses. There is a silo of 68 tons capacity, 
and plenty of excellent pasturage. I shall fill the silo, 
will raise all the field corn I need and enough soiing 
crops to help out the pasturage during the dry spell. Now 
with this data, and ignoring all other questions, can you 
tell me what are the best crops to plant and how many 
acres of e.acb, in order to raise, so far as possible, every¬ 
thing that will be consumed during the entire year by 
the 15 cows and five horses? t. p. 
T. P. should have no difficulty in producing enough 
feed on a 95-acre farm in Bucks County to provide 
feed for 15 cows and five horses. Realizing that 
Alfalfa, silage and corn are the most economical 
products to produce for feeding farm animals, his 
rotation should be arranged so as to provide these 
products in abundance. Thirty-six tons of Alfalfa 
hay would easily satisfy the 20 animals mentioned, 
and this could easily be produced from an eight-acre 
field; 20 acres of corn would provide sufficient grain 
and roughage for all the animals; while 12 acres of 
silage corn would more than fill the 68-ton silo that 
is in use at the farm. This would leave 25 or 30 
acres for pasture with a liberal allowance for the 
location of buildings and other minor crops. Oats 
and Canada field peas can be seeded and fed suc¬ 
cessfully as a green forage or cured as hay; the 
ground to be later followed by the seeding of Alfalfa 
which can best be made from the 1st to the 15th of 
August in that section. I doubt very much if it 
would pay T. P. to grow forage crops in case corn 
can be grown successfully and placed in the silo for 
Summer feeding, as the labor problem is a serious 
drawback to the production of soiling crops under 
average farm conditions. This must be considered. 
It is estimated that the 
Alfalfa will average five 
tons of hay per acre; 
the field corn will yield 
50 bushels of corn to 
the acre; while the 
silage should average 10 
tons per acre. If it is 
planned to maintain 
only 15 head of dairy 
animals on a 95-acre 
farm it would not be 
necessary to practice in¬ 
tensive farming, or 
grow soiling crops after 
the regular rotation was 
established. A ration for 
the dairy cows would be 
Alfalfa hay and silage; 
supplemented by corn 
and cob meal with a lit¬ 
tle . cotton-seed meal 
added it would supply 
the most economical 
ration, and would be re¬ 
manner, but trees in which the ground was well 
soaked by water before freezing occurs thaw out in 
the Spring and proceed in the Spring without injury 
to the tips. 
So-called sunscald is not due to this sort of condi¬ 
tion. It occurs in this region when a hot sun thaws 
out the frozen tree trunk or limbs on the side on 
which the tree is struck by the direct rays. The 
669 
One must main¬ 
tain a good pressure with the pump, the other must 
systematically, taking one large branch after another, 
cover all parts, top, bottom and both sides, go over 
the whole tree till each part has been thoroughly 
covered, if good results are to be obtained. 
The third reason for failure to control many in¬ 
sects and fungi, is because of beginning operations 
too late in the season. If larva of the Codling moth 
cambium or growth layer is thus started into activity has made its entrance into the apple, no amount of 
by the warmth. When this takes place and is fol- spraying will make that a perfect apple. The insect 
lowed by a heavy frost the living division cells under will work away unmolested. If the scab of pears has 
the bark are killed by the freezing and thawing pro- entered the tissue of the plant and fruit, scabby pears 
cess. In the Spring these injuries are largely ex- will result. To be successful exercise care in pre¬ 
tended by various parasitic organisms, especially by paration of all spray materials, be thorough and 
apple blight in the case of that tree. When this dis- systematic in applying so that every part will be 
ease is present so as to come in contact with such covered with spray material, and be in time to feed 
frozen areas of the tree, the sunscalded area is very the poison to the insect, or have the fungicide kill 
considerably extended. Such sunscalded areas should the germinating spore of the disease. 
be opened up and disinfected with a strong formalde 
hyde solution, and then recovered by cloth packings, 
grafting wax or other protection. Persons who do 
not wish their trees to winter-kill and sunscald may 
do several things which will tend to prevent great 
damage. 
1. On young tender trees, apple, pear or shade 
trees, protect the south and west side of the tree 
from the direct rays of the sun during the freezing 
months. 
Conn. Agr’l. College. 
A. T. STEVENS. 
THE COUNTRY HIGH SCHOOL GRADUATE. 
To start with, I wish to say that I am a young man 
on the farm, a high school graduate, whose place for 
the present at least is at home, on account of my 
father’s invalidism. The question, however, has often 
occurred to me whether I should make farming my 
life work. Nature appeals to me in all her- forms. 
As I look about among the farmers of this neigh- 
2 . Cease cultivating in the Autumn months and borhood conditions are seen on every hand which may 
aim to have the trees ripen up their wood before well set one to thinking. Here, for instance, is a 
1 n er sets in - Tr y to escape the late Autumn man struggling with debt. His family look pale and 
gr ° W ‘ . pinched, and show that prematurely old look which 
. * lere 1S not a good supply of subsoil moisture comes so often with the oppression of poverty. Off 
in the close of the Autumn, just as the Winter is on another road is another farmer. His house is 
well painted and a large 
new barn shelters his 
stock. He is sleek and 
well preserved for his 
fifty-odd years; but his 
wife begins to show the 
effect of taking care of 
the large family in ad¬ 
dition to helping with 
the cows and chickens. 
When the oldest daugh¬ 
ter wished to carry her 
schooling beyond the 
school of her own dis¬ 
trict did she do it? 
Well, I guess not. She 
went to work, most of 
the time away from 
home. And the oldest 
boy, after a hard Sum¬ 
mer’s work, when about 
18 or 19, picked up his 
clothes and left for the 
city without consulting 
his father. A more pleas- 
A FLOCK OF FLOURISHING WHITE HOLLAND TURKEYS. 
(See Page 671.) 
Fig. 250. 
pounded 7 by°utUizing ^urch^sYd^f^stuffs^ 0 " ^ ^ in ’ thc ground should be flooded so as ant picture is that of the young man who runs the 
A p Ieea stuns. to insure a good subsoil moisture supply. 
each a good dlilv S ra W t ion vvTu IT' 6 ^ After the Win,er has actua "? set in aad the 
. , E ? a y ratI0 , n would JC mne I’Oimds of ground has become thoroughly frozen put on a 
Alfalfa hay; eight pounds corn; three pounds wheat ™ , , r 4 . ° y c ’ on . a 
bran. The corn fodder can be utilized to advantage LTn ' ,1 sucl \ a manner that the ■“ 
with both the cows and horses during the Winter !„ ' g ™ "" ‘ n SPnng ' 
— • 6 No. Dakota Exp. Station. henry l. bolley. 
months. This arrangement does away entirely with 
the growing of oats and other expensive grains; it 
being assumed that a cover crop of rye and vetch or 
wheat and vetch is to be seeded in your cornfields 
farm next to ours. He is an alumnus of my high 
school, and a very fine man in every way. For about 
eight years after leaving school he was a rural mail 
carrier. Now his main business is dairying, and he 
understands it well. One day I asked him if he was 
doing as well now financially as he formerly did on 
the R. h. D. route. Fie said, “No, but a fellow^doesn’t 
want to carry mail all his life.” These cases, I think, 
are fairly typical for this locality; they range from a 
THREE REASONS FOR POOR SPRAYING 
_ -- j -J f—-. wwz, zv?,-tw.Ljr , nicy lailgc 11UIII i 
at the time of the last cultivation a 'nortion of the ♦■ ^ “ SPraymg ^ dUC t0 P °° r Condition of poverty to comfortable circumstances, 
e time ot tne last cultivation a portion of the preparation of spray materials than from any other But all too often has the wealth been accumulated 
to'be nlowed I! 31 ! ^ ^ g ’ the ^ n ] ainder one cause. This is especially true in the use of arse- by lowering the standards of living and by sacrificing 
1 nrltue t Z V"*" T* ^ " ate ° f Iea(L Many people ’ in mixin g ** P* the those finer qualities of life which mean somuch to 
P a t ce it is possible to grow corn on the same thick paste arsenate directly into the spray barrel or the educated person 
area for several years in succession without depleting tank. By stirring slightly they obtain a milky solu- 
I’eVshouMbeTreLtbrcured and" thra^dTihe u" “I “"‘fb "’ e “ *” in —P-n-on. wn.cn t „e country boy sotnetunes feels toward the 
iney snoiuci De preferably cured and thrashed, as the It i S not so. I have attempted many times to mix farm? They may be in a measure- but would von 
crushed oats and pea meal make a splendid grain arsenate in this way, and invariably find on emptying shackle the boy to the occupation of his father in 
mixttire for young grow.ng stock. c. minkler. out the n,a.erial that fully half, in ,nany instances, is which there is "so much “Z, by heepjng 1.^ 
not mixed. The material thus sprayed on has only in ignorance of everything but farming? And could 
about half strength, and no doubt that which was a few hours a week of high school instruction in 
sprayed from the first was not more than one-fourth agriculture blind his eyes to the glaring defects of 
strength. Both arsenate of lead and Paris green 
Are the schools at all to blame for this repugnance 
which the country boy sometimes feels toward the 
N. J. Exp. Station. 
SUNSCALD AND FIRE BLIGHT. 
I have not made a specific study of this question. 
Studying fire blight and so-called sunscaled and upon 
farm life in some of the poorer communities with 
- - ---- aim uimu snould, after being weighed, be mixed with a small which he is acquainted? While I wish to be loyal to 
various tree treating experiments for the first named amount of water till they are an even creamy mass, the farm, I can see reasons which are seldom given 
disease, I have come to some pretty definite ideas and then washed into the spray barrel. Then before by the agricultural enthusiasts why a young man 
with regard to the matter, but hardly feel justified beginning to spray this whole mixture should be might do better to take up some other line of & work 
in giving any extended discussion upon the point. In thoroughly agitated. If the high school graduate from the farm feels 
North Dakota, there is often a large amount of A second cause for failures is poor application of that his talents call in other directions is it not his 
damage done to shade trees as well as to apple and spray materials. I have seen men who have been privilege or even his duty to go? The man should 
other small fruit trees, and I am convinced of one spraying (or seeming to do) for many years, under be at all times greater than his occupation; if he 
or two points. So far as this climate is concerned, good instruction, who do not thoroughly cover the finds in due time that he was mistaken, that it is the 
dying back of the rapidly-grown shoots, those which plant or tree sprayed. Lack of system and thorough- farm that calls, may he not go back, richer and more 
were produced rapidly during the last season, does ness is a waste of material and time. One man rais- f . rom llis vari( j d experiences to help himself and 
not take place in most trees if the subsoil moisture ing and lowering the handle of the pump and another u n ij lghb ? rS r Wider education in practical affairs 
is in sufficient quantity. After an ordinary Winter holding the spray rod, pointing into a Le top, £«rittte f ”„ k *“ er farml " g ’ ' £ f “'’ da "’“‘al char- 
* A. H, G. 
